Economic and Social Development - World food council (wfc)

The world food situation in the early 1970s was marked by extreme food
shortages in many developing countries in Africa and parts of Southeast
Asia, by a general lack of progress in the world fight against hunger
and malnutrition, and by very slow progress in the creation of a system
of internationally coordinated cereal reserves to meet crop shortfalls
and other abnormal situations.

It was against this background that the General Assembly decided, in
1973, to convene a conference to deal with global food problems. The UN
World Food Conference, held in Rome in November 1974, called for the
creation of a 36-member ministerial-level World Food Council to review
annually major problems and policy issues affecting the world food
situation and to bring its political influence to bear on governments
and UN bodies and agencies alike.

Each year up through 1992 the WFC met in plenary session at the
invitation of one of its member states. The council, as a subsidiary
body of the UN General Assembly, reports annually to it through the
Economic and Social Council.

At first, the WFC's approach to solving world food problems was
to encourage the adoption of national food strategies by developing
countries. Under this plan, each country would assess its present food
situation, including needs, supply, potential for increasing food
production, storage, processing, transport, distribution, marketing, and
the ability to meet food emergencies. In the early 1980s, this concept
was taken over by the World Bank.

In 1989, at its 15th session held in Cairo, Egypt, the WFC delineated a
Programme of Co-operative Action with four main goals for UN member
countries within the next decade: the elimination of starvation and
death caused by famine; a substantial reduction of malnutrition and
mortality among young children; a tangible reduction in chronic hunger;
and the elimination of major nutritional-deficiency diseases. The
Programme of Co-Operative Action contained proposals for immediate
action to be taken on food-for-work programs in rural areas where
employment opportunities are not available and measures to make specific
food items affordable to the poor. Over the longer term, the WFC
recommended projects to create production and employment opportunities
in rural and urban areas; community initiative projects designed to
enable the communities themselves to identify and implement projects;
vocational training schemes; retraining schemes; food stamp schemes. In
the area of nutrition, the WFC recommended the implementation on an
emergency basis of supplementary feeding programs for children; primary
health care programs, including programs to improve sanitation and
drinking water; family planning programs; nutritional education
programs; and support to food and nutrition programs undertaken by WHO,
UNICEF, and other international agencies.

At its 16th session in 1990, held in Bangkok, Thailand, the council
observed that most countries had not yet set specific goals and targets
to implement its call to action. However, by 1991 those goals had been
adopted by all UN member states as part of the International Development
Strategy for the Fourth United Nations Development Decade.

The WFC also considered the coordination of the activities of some 35
international agencies that have programs significantly related to
hunger problems. The WFC observed that its own role was that of
providing a central, undivided focus on hunger and recommended the
creation of an inter-secretariat consultative mechanism among the four
Rome-based food organizations (FAO, IFAD, WFC, and WFP). In 1991,
meeting in Helsingor, Denmark, it reiterated this support. It noted with
concern the great financial difficulties facing these international
organizations.

The 18th session of the WFC met in 1992 in Nairobi, Kenya. Its report to
the General Assembly noted that although most developing regions made
some headway during the 1980s in reducing hunger and malnutrition, this
was not the case for the peoples of Africa where disastrous droughts and
civil disturbances had caused widespread starvation in recent years. The
council praised the IFAD Special Programme for Sub-Saharan African
Countries Affected by Drought and Desertification. In response to the
disastrous problems of Africa, the WFC called for a "New Green
Revolution," and the intensified transfer of technology to
accomplish such a revolution. It recommended that substantial increases
in investments in research, extension, and training were needed,
particularly in Africa.

In 1992 the WFC also noted the problems of millions of people in Eastern
Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States (formerly the USSR) in
gaining access to adequate food as a result of the dislocation of their
economies.

In the context of the efforts of the General Assembly to streamline the
activities of the United Nations, the WFC considered its future role
within the framework of the restructuring process. With disarming
frankness, the council stated: "We agree that the council has
fallen short of achieving the political leadership and coordination role
expected from its founders at the 1974 World Food Conference." It
concluded that, in a rapidly changing world, the continuation of the
status quo for the World Food Council and the United Nations as a whole
was not possible. It established an ad hoc committee to review the
mandate and future role of the WFC, which met in New York on
14–15 September 1992 and submitted its report to the 47th Session
of the General Assembly (1992). However, the committee could not reach
agreement on what the council's future role should be. Views
ranged from abolishing it to strengthening it and integrating its
mandate with another intergovernmental body. With this the committee
referred the matter to the General Assembly, which requested the council
members to continue attempts to agree on appropriate measures to be
taken. After informal meetings from January to May 1993, the council
reported to the General Assembly that "Council members are agreed
on a set of principles to guide the United Nations response to global
food and hunger problems, but disagreements continue to exist concerning
the most effective institutional response to these principles."

In 1993 no formal WFC session was held, nor were any substantive
documents prepared by the WFC secretariat. In fact, in December 1993,
the secretariat in Rome was abolished as a result of the restructuring
of the United Nations. Responsibility for servicing any future meetings
of the WFC was given to the newly formed Department for Policy
Coordination and Sustainable Development (DPCSD) in New York.

In November 1993 the president of the World Food Council held informal
consultations with other WFC ministers of agriculture during the
biennial FAO Conference in Rome about the possibility of scheduling the
next (19th) session of the council. The consultations were inconclusive
and the future of the WFC was not taken up at the General
Assembly's 48th regular session in light of these ongoing
discussions.

At a General Assembly plenary meeting on 26 May 1996 it was recommended
that the World Food Council be discontinued and its functions absorbed
by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and World Food Program
(WFP). To eliminate duplicative and overlapping efforts, this
recommendation was heeded and the WFC was dissolved. The move was
generally hailed as a sign that the Assembly was rededicating itself to
better use of its resources. As the FAO and WFP became heirs to the
World Food Council's initiatives, the restructuring was also
viewed as a reinforcement of ECOSOC's development-related
activities. (For more information on the UN's ongoing work to
combat hunger around the globe, please see the chapter on the Food and
Agriculture Organization.)

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY FOR DEVELOPMENT
A major event of the first UN Development Decade was the UN Conference
on the Application of Science and Technology for the Benefit of the Less
Developed Countries, held in Geneva in 1963. The conference focused
world attention on the practical possibilities of accelerating
development through the application of advances in science and
technology and on the need for reorienting research toward the
requirements of the developing countries.

A second conference, the UN Conference on Science and Technology for
Development, held in Vienna in 1979, adopted a program of action (the
Vienna Programme) designed to put science and technology to work for the
economic development of all countries, particularly the developing
countries. It recommended the creation by the General Assembly of a
high-level intergovernmental committee on science and technology for
development, open to all member states, and the establishment of a
voluntary fund to be administered by UNDP.

The Geneva Conference was a predominantly technical or pragmatic
conference at which developed countries provided developing countries
with state-of-the-art reports on developed-country technologies. By
contrast, the Vienna Conference reflected the 1970s discussions between
developed and developing countries over a more equal access of the
latter to the world's science and technology. Thus science and
technology were placed within the context of international diplomacy.
The result, the Vienna Programme of Action was a compromise that did not
fully meet the expectations of the developing countries.

The Vienna Programme of Action was divided into three target areas:
strengthening the science and technology capacities of developing
countries; restructuring the existing pattern of international
scientific and technological relations; and strengthening the role of
the UN system in the field of science and technology and the provision
of increased financial resources.

Endorsing the recommendations of the Vienna conference, the General
Assembly decided to establish an Intergovernmental Committee on Science
and Technology for Development (ISTD), to be open to all states, and to
create within the UN Secretariat a Center for Science and Technology for
Development (CSTD) to provide substantive support to the committee and
to coordinate activities within the UN system. In 1982, the General
Assembly established the UN Financing System for Science and Technology
for Development to finance a broad range of activities intended to
strengthen the endogenous scientific and technological capacities of
developing countries. In 1986, it transferred the responsibilities and
resources of the financing system to a newly created UN Fund for Science
and Technology for Development, administered by UNDP. In 1992, this new
voluntary fund amounted to
US
$1.56 million and had funded six policy meetings in Cape Verde, Jamaica,
Pakistan, Togo, Uganda, and Vietnam.

In 1989, on the tenth anniversary of the Vienna Conference, the General
Assembly expressed its disappointment with the implementation of the
Vienna Programme. As part of the effort to rationalize and reform the
entire United Nations system, in April 1992, the General Assembly
decided to transform the ISTD into a functional commission of ECOSOC,
the Commission on Science and Technology for Development. The activities
of the Centre for Science and Technology for Development were
incorporated into the new Department of Economic and Social Development,
within its Division of Science, Technology, Energy, Environment and
Natural Resources.

Major objectives of the commission, which held its first session in
April 1993, included:

Assisting ECOSOC in providing science and technology policy guidelines
and recommendations to member states, in particular developing
countries;

Providing innovative approaches to improving the quality of
coordination and cooperation in the area of science and technology
within the United Nations system, with a view to ensuring optimum
mobilization of resources;

Providing expert advice to other parts of the UN system.

The commission also requested that the Secretary-General prepare
proposals to improve the coordination of the different bodies in the UN
system, including the World Bank, which are involved in science and
technology activities.

Developments, such as the United Nations Conference on Environment and
Development in 1992—which had substantial science and technology
components—and changing attitudes within intergovernmental bodies
regarding the role of government and the private sector in view of the
end of the cold war, led to the need for a major restructuring of the
United Nations in the economic and social sector (including science and
technology). While the General Assembly confirmed the continued validity
of the Vienna Programme of Action in its resolution on science and
technology for development in December 1993, its objectives were merged
with the Technology Programme of the UN Conference on Trade and
Development (UNCTAD). UNCTAD thus became responsible for science and
technology within the United Nations system. Major program elements of
the revised work program include:

Endogenous capacity-building and resource mobilization in the area of
science and technology for development;

Technology assessment and information services;

Issues related to investment and technology transfer.

The Commission on Science and Technology also decided to adopt themes
for study by working groups during the two-year periods between its
sessions. For 1993–95, these included technology for small-scale
economic activities to address the basic needs of low-income
populations, the gender implications of science and technology for
developing countries, and the science and technology aspects of work
being considered by the Commission on Sustainable Development. The
commission also considered studying a variety of other issues, including
the role of technology in military conversion, the effect of new and
emerging technologies on industrialization, and the role of information
technologies in developing countries.

In October 1998, it was recommended that the membership of the
Commission on Science and Technology for Development, along with three
other subsidiaries of the Economic and Social Council, be reconstituted.
The commission's membership was subsequently reduced from 53 to
33, with the following geographic distribution: eight members from
African states; seven from Asian states; six from Latin America and the
Caribbean; four from Eastern Europe; and eight from Western European and
other states. The body remains a functional commission of the Council,
with members holding office for four years.

At its Fourth Session, held in May 1999 in Geneva, the focus was on
science and technology partnerships and networking for national
capacity-building; particular attention was paid to bio-technology and
energy. During the meeting, the commission discussed the concept of
global entitlement to knowledge, the changing role of the state in the
development of science and technology, and the role of networking and
partnership in a multi-disciplinary approach to science and technology.
In summarizing the proceedings, the moderator concluded that since
sustainable development can be thought of as composed of economic
growth, social equity, and an adequate use of the environment, and since
government is viewed as a "key articulator" of these, the
role of science and technology in the near future should be to establish
reliable frameworks for consistent communication, effective
fore-casting, and the dissemination of knowledge.

Transnational Corporations

Since the end of World War II, the role of multinational or
transnational corporations in international commerce has been growing,
but information on their activities has been fragmentary and often
closely held. Many of these corporations are household names. They
conduct a large portion of their business outside their host country,
often recruiting management from their overseas subsidiaries and
recruiting shareholders around the world. Some of these corporations
command resources greater than those of most governments represented at
the UN. In 1989, estimated sales by foreign affiliates of transnationals
worldwide were
US
$4.5 trillion. In comparison, world exports were only
US
$3 trillion. In 2000, the top 200 transnational corporations'
combined sales were larger than the combined economies of all 191
countries in the world minus the largest nine (the US, Japan, Germany,
France, Italy, the United Kingdom, Brazil, Canada, and China). The
combined GDPs of the other 182 countries was $6.9 trillion, and the
combined sales of the top 200 transnational corporations was $7.1
trillion. The relationship of transnational corporations with developing
countries frequently has been troubled, but they can provide capital,
managerial expertise, and technology that are all urgently required for
development and often would be hard to come by in any other way.

In 1972, the Economic and Social Council requested the Secretary-General
to appoint a group of eminent persons to study the impact of
transnational corporations on development and international relations.
The group of 20 economists, government officials, and corporation
executives from all parts of the world met in 1973 and heard testimony
from 50 witnesses in public hearings—a procedure new to the UN.
Its report, issued in 1974, recommended the creation of a permanent
commission on transnational corporations under the Economic and Social
Council and an information and research center in the UN Secretariat.

In December 1974, the council established an intergovernmental
Commission on Transnational Corporations as a standing committee (not a
functional commission) to furnish a forum within the UN system regarding
such corporations; promote an exchange of views about them among
governments, intergovernmental organizations, business, labor, and
consumers; assist the council in developing the basis for a code of
conduct on the activities of transnational corporations; and develop a
comprehensive information system on their activities.

The 48-member commission meets annually. At its second session, held in
Lima in March 1976, it gave priority to the elaboration of a code of
conduct and recommended that the Economic and Social Council establish
an Intergovernmental Working Group on a Code of Conduct. The code was to
be the first multi-laterally agreed framework governing all aspects of
the relations between states and transnational corporations, with
standards to protect the interests of both the host countries and
investors in those countries. The working group held a number of
negotiating sessions between 1977 and 1982. Negotiations continued in
meetings of a special session of the commission, open to all states.

In April 1991, the commission approved a text authorizing the
preparation of recommendations on encouraging TNCs to cooperate in
efforts to protect and enhance the environment in all countries for
submission to the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED)
in 1992. The commission agreed that the following issues should be
addressed: internationally agreed standards; improving management and
regulation of industrial processes; transferring environmentally sound
technologies to developing countries on favorable terms; using
environment and development accounting and reporting methods;
international environmental management; preventive measures to minimize
risks to human life, property, and the environment; and the question of
reparations for damage. It directed its secretariat, the Center on
Transnational Corporations, to prepare its submission to UNCED. However,
in early 1992, the center's functions were absorbed into a new
department of the Secretariat and eventually transferred altogether to
UNCTAD (see below).

At its 1994 Substantive Session, the commission recommended to ECOSOC
that it be integrated into the institutional machinery of the UN
Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). ECOSOC decided to transmit
this recommendation to the General Assembly for action.

An Intergovernmental Group of Experts on International Standards of
Accounting and Reporting, established by the Economic and Social Council
in 1982, reviews issues that give rise to divergent accounting and
reporting practices of transnational corporations and identifies areas
where efforts at harmonization appear necessary.

The four other priorities for the commission's program of work
were: establishment of an information system to advance understanding of
the nature of transnational corporations and their effects on home and
host countries; research into the effects of their operations; technical
assistance; and work leading to a more precise definition of the term
transnational corporations.

The UN Center on Transnational Corporations was established by the
Economic and Social Council in 1974 as part of the UN Secretariat. The
functions of the center were to develop a comprehensive information
system on the activities of transnational corporations, using data from
governmental, corporate, and other sources; to analyze and disseminate
the information to all governments; to provide technical assistance and
strengthen the capacity of host countries (especially developing
countries) in their dealings with transnational corporations; and to
carry out political, legal, economic, and social research, particularly
research to help in devising a code of conduct. By 1985, the center had
established that the 350 largest transnational corporations (half of
which were based in the United States) had combined sales of
US
$2.7 trillion, a sum which was larger than the combined GNP of all the
developing countries, including China.

In 1990 ECOSOC requested the Center on Transnational Corporations to
undertake a survey of corporate environmental management to document the
most advanced practices as models for companies that had not yet created
environmental programs and to submit the results to UNCED. The
"Benchmark Corporate Environmental Survey," was submitted
to the UNCED preparatory meeting in August 1991. Twenty percent of the
163 firms surveyed responded. The center recommended UNCED consider the
following recommendations in preparing its Agenda 21: increased
international cooperation to better inform TNCs of the impact of their
operations on the greenhouse phenomenon; include TNCs in the
consultative process surrounding climate change studies; treat dioxins
and PCBs as international, not just local, pollution problems;
transnational affiliates in developing countries should handle toxic
wastes according to the same rules as in developed countries; TNCs
should create safety zones around their facilities to lessen the
potential impact of accidents; the oceans should be protected from
land-based pollution; TNCs should sponsor programs to save wetlands and
rainforests and protect biodiversity; TNCs should help develop a code of
conduct on biotechnology. The center also pointed out that environmental
rules and regulations differed from country to country. The companies
that responded to the survey were interested in the UN setting
international guidelines, although many of them were unaware of the
existence of current international guidelines.

In 1992, as part of the comprehensive restructuring of the UN
secretariat, the functions of the center were incorporated into a new
unit: the Transnational Corporations and Management Division of the
Department of Economic and Social Development. In May 1993, the General
Assembly transferred responsibility for the transnational program again
to the secretariat of UNCTAD.

In 2000, the UNCTAD Advisory Service on Investment and Technology, based
on the joint work of the secretariat Divisions on Transnational
Corporations and Investment and on Science and Technology, was working
to help developing countries expand "their enterprise sector in
conjunction with wider national trade, technology, and investment
strategies." UNCTAD provided analysis of the role of the largest
transnational corporations (TNCs) in foreign direct investment (viewed
as critical to development) and emphasized that TNCs must exercise
social responsibility in order to support sustainable development.